


Take Back the Sky

by Sorrel



Series: What Season May Come [2]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, Failboats In Love, Friends to Lovers, Friendship/Love, Male-Female Friendship, Pining, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-20
Updated: 2015-11-28
Packaged: 2018-04-27 07:25:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,638
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5039188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sorrel/pseuds/Sorrel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"We needed a leader, and you have proven yourself."</p><p>The road to closing the Breach was a long one, but the road to defeat Corypheus will be longer still.  Demons, dragons, and cultists abound- and politicians, far worse.  You wouldn't think that there'd be time to fall in love, but somehow Cullen and Evelyn find a way.  (Sequel to "What Season May Come.")</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. red and blue

**Author's Note:**

> Unlike the previous story, this one is being posted as I work on it, rather than waiting till completion. You have been warned!

When the worst comes to pass, Cullen is a good soldier and he does his duty. Evelyn takes her people to the front to defend the trebuchets, and Cullen does his best to make the most of the time she's buying them, setting soldiers and pilgrims alike to focus on getting the horses and druffalo out, harnessed, and packed with every piece of food and gear that can be easily packed. Food and tents are the highest priority, along with blankets, but Josephine has several assistants packing papers and books as fast as possible. If they manage to survive this, those records and agreements could mean the difference between success and utter collapse.

There's never any doubt in his mind that they will have to flee. Haven's defenses, unfortunately, are about as strong as damp parchment. They've done their best, making the rocky mountain slopes into traps, building walls and placing trebuchets, but they hadn't exactly been prepared for an army. None of them have been satisfied with that, but there have always been more pressing matters- and who could possibly have predicted _this?_

Despite the fact that the attack interrupted a drunken revelry, their people are quick and efficient at their tasks, faces grim and terrified but, mostly, not faltering. They get more done than Cullen could have even dreamed- but all of it, of course, seems to come to naught when the the Archdemon appears.

They hear the scream first. Most of them don't recognize the noise, and how could they? A few of them hear it, though, and a couple take up an alarmed shout that struggles to be heard over the fading echoes of the recent avalanche and the ragged cheer of victory. The creature sweeps in on shockingly noiseless wings, for its size, but all of them notice when it screams again, right over their heads. It's too late to make any kind of retreat, however, and none of them fighting at the front can do anything but cower in the certainty of their deaths as the dragon opens its mouth and a warning glow of fire starts to lick up from the back of its throat.

Evelyn throws up a shield over them all so fast it seems to flash into place, and Cullen can only watch in awe and horror as the dragon's fire bounces harmlessly off the barrier over his head. It's so close he can see the individual lick and curl from the flames, can feel the heat against his skin like standing next to an inferno. For a moment, his entire world is the red of the fire and the blue of the struggling barrier, and then it is gone, and they are untouched.

He doesn't have time to process the way that Evelyn has saved his life yet again, however, because the dragon moves on past the front lines and into the town proper. From the boom and crash that he hears behind him, the rest of the town isn't so lucky, and he knows, deep down in his bones, that there is no way to survive this. Even a dozen mages of her caliber could not protect the entire town from the likes of that beast, and Evelyn, at least, must already be worn out nearly to the dregs from closing the Breach mere hours before. It's a pure miracle that she managed to throw a shield so large at all. Some few stragglers may be able to escape, but with a dragon on their side the enemy will be able to halt any concerted effort to get around the body of the army. They're trapped like rats on a sinking ship, and Cullen knows it. Looking across the expanse of mud and corpses to Evelyn, he can see that she knows it as well.

Still, they go through the motions. He calls a retreat to the Chantry and gathers survivors as he goes, while Evelyn and Cassandra split up, taking two teams and leading sweeps up along the edges of town, collecting stragglers. The dragon swoops and screams over their heads, but does not blast them with fire again, likely needing some time to recharge after the first bout of destruction. As Cullen works his way up the main steps it banks and veers off down the mountain, and he knows that it's likely going to come back with more trouble, but for the moment he decides to be grateful for the reprieve. The men give a ragged cheer as if someone has actually done anything to drive it off, and start moving with renewed speed.

It takes longer than he'd like, but eventually he meets Evelyn and Cassandra at the front of the Chantry. Well, Cassandra, at least- Evelyn falls back at the last moment she and Blackwall lure a pair of redstone monstrosities away from some lagging soldiers and start working on cutting them to pieces. He can't worry about her, he can't, he has to look after his own, and there's no shortage of those here. Everywhere he looks there's a milling crowd of horses and cattle, frantic workers darting about in between, trying to keep them calm. He half-wonders how the beasts have survived intact with the red Templars roaming the town, but then he spots the barrier.

Most of the survivors have been pulled back into the Chantry proper, but Lady Vivienne is standing near the doors, her staff planted solidly in the ground and her hands pale-knuckled around it, a soft blue light streaming away from her fingers. As he urges people through the doors, he sees a red Templar hit the edge of her barrier and fall screaming to the ground. He fancy white coat is streaked with mud and black blood and somewhat charred around the edges- he is, in spite of himself, perhaps a little impressed.

It takes another minute to get the remaining survivors directed into the Chantry, but then he turns back, his hand to his blade in case the others need assistance. Evelyn and Blackwall seem to be holding their own, however, one beast down and Sera peppering the remaining one with arrows almost too fast to see as Pavus pressures it to stay away from the workers with near-constant stream of flame.

"Stop playing with the nice Templar and finish it!" Pavus shouts, as Evelyn ducks a swing from an enormous bladed paw.

"Gladly, if it would like to stop playing with me!" Evelyn shouts back, but she seems to take his words to heart, because she hurtles her staff over the thing's shoulder, and when it turns slowly, ponderously to follow the trajectory, she tucks and rolls between its legs, coming to her feet on the other side. The ground she crossed glows red. "Get back!" she screams to Blackwall, who obeys without hesitation, and then the mine she placed flashes a brighter red and explodes, taking the redstone beast with it.

Evelyn ducks to retrieve her thrown staff from the ground and then straightens, panting, as Blackwall and Pavus crowd in next to her, anxious gazes checking to ensure that she's unscathed. "I'm fine," she tells them brusquely, and then crosses the ground to his side, picking her way through the crowd of men and beasts with a soothing hand here, an easy smile there. Behind her, the mess grows a little more orderly, a little less panicked. _The Herald is here,_ Cullen can see them thinking, _we might actually make it through this._

Her face when she reaches him is grim, however. She gives a short nod to Vivienne, who nods regally in return, her shield unfaltering, and then Evelyn turns to Cullen, and in her eyes he can see the same thing he's thinking: _We're not going to make it through this one._


	2. make some noise

Evelyn stares at Cullen's retreating back and thinks, _You idiot, why didn't you kiss him?_

Not right then, obviously. She's very probably going to die within the hour, and trashy novels aside, it's generally bad manners to break months of flirting on the eve of your own death. If she's going to die, she should let him mourn a friend rather than the promise of something more. It's just rude.

But why didn't she kiss him before? Why didn't she kiss him last night, when they rode up into the mountains alone and talked of regrets and foolish young loves and she slept curled within the circle of his arm? Why didn't she kiss him the evening before, when she _ran_ to catch up to him, and he smiled at her like the sun coming up and admitted that he was looking for her? Why didn't she kiss him weeks before, after their make-peace night at the tavern when he stood so close and spoke with such a low velvet voice, or _any bloody time for the last several months,_ since Maker knows she's been wanting to do that almost since the start.

He never seemed quite interested enough for her to risk it, but she flirted close enough to the line a time or two anyway. Why hadn't she just gone for it? What's the worst that could have happened, he might have said no and had things get strange between them for a time? By now she's sure enough of him to believe that their friendship could survive such awkwardness. And at least she wouldn't be going to her grave without _knowing._ Just once.

But regret is a luxury she can't afford, so she only allows herself a single moment to close her eyes and imagine another world. Just a moment. And then she opens her eyes and turns, all business.

"All right, people," she says. "You heard the man; we're to make sure those bastards stay off our men." Start with the hardest thing, her master always said, and work your way downhill. "Cassandra-"

"You have my shield, Herald."

Always Cassandra has to make things difficult, Evelyn thinks wryly. "-guard the others," she says, gently. "They will need your blade."

"You will need it more."

The pugnacious jut of Cassandra's jaw is so familiar by now that Evelyn thinks she could likely draw it in her sleep. Who would have thought, when this all began, that Cassandra would become such a steadfast companion, such a trusted comrade? Without Cassandra's shield at her side, she will feel unbalanced, out of place. And yet.

"Yes, but if I fall to the dragon, they'll need someone to lead them to safety. You're the only one I trust."

"Commander Cullen-"

Evelyn doesn't flinch. She doesn't. "Is not the one who built this Inquisition from scratch," she says firmly, because standing firm is the only way that she can enforce her will in this matter. Master William's voice whispers in her ear: _Always act as if you're certain of your decisions, and justify them however need be to get the job done. Waver even for an instant, and your men will never follow you._ "I need someone I trust leading them free so that I can focus on the task in front of me." It doesn't seem like enough, so she goes for the big weapon. "I need this from you, Cassandra. Please."

She can't read what emotion crosses the other woman's face, but it's sudden and intense- and then gone, as Cassandra's face falls into the still calm she draws on before battle. "Of course, Lady Herald," she says, and then bows once, as smoothly as any chevalier, her fist over her heart. "Do not fail."

"I'll try my best." _One down,_ she tells herself. "Bull. I hate to deprive you of a chance to fight a dragon-"

"-but they need another commander," Bull says easily. "You got it, Boss."

There's a lot of reasons she likes working with Bull. "Solas, you're with him. They'll need a healer more than I need another staff."

Also, Solas is a deeply accomplished mage, but not the best fighter at close range, and in the tight quarters of Haven's streets they won't have the luxury of distance. She already took one blow for him on the push to get up to the Chantry, and she doesn't think well of his chances on the way back down. Solas is hardly unaware of his own strengths and weakness, and the knowledge rides between them as he nods, shortly, in agreement.

"Sera-"

"I can't," Sera blurts, her eyes wide and terrified. "I'm sorry, but I bloody can't. I can't go back out there."

"Wouldn't ask you to." A more talented archer she's never met, but she can never forget that Sera's only eighteen, nineteen at most. Still barely more than a girl, really, and seen too much already. "Somebody's got to fire the signal arrow. And I know how much you love setting shit on fire."

Sera swallows hard. "You'll see it from the bloody moon," she swears. "And I better see _you_ on the other side, your ladybits." Then she turns and bolts like hounds are on her heels.

That dealt with, Evelyn turns to her three remaining companions, takes a deep breath. "I won't ask you to go with me-" she starts, but her speech is immediately cut short by Dorian's disdainful snort.

"Well, you're certainly not leaving us behind," he says.

She swallows hard at his easy loyalty. _He's only known you a fucking month,_ she thinks bleakly, _he shouldn't be so willing to follow you to the grave,_ but she can't say him nay and he knows it. She can only nod.

"Tryin' to kill an archdemon's what I'm for, really," Blackwall chimes in wryly. His grip on his sword hilt is white-knuckled, and his face is drawn tight with stress, but there's nothing but certainty in his weathered face.

"Looks like I got nothing better to do," Varric says, and her gaze goes to him as if magnetized. He offers up a smile that isn't very funny at all. "After all, out of the lot of us, who else has actually fought a dragon before?"

"Not your fight," she tells him, voice leaden, but he shakes his head.

"Isn't it everybody's?"

Her throat goes tight, and she reaches down to put her hand to his shoulder. Her first friend here. She's collected others over the months, Cullen and Dorian of particular note, but Varric was the first one to treat her like an actual person instead of a religious icon, and she owes him more for that than she can repay.

He grabs her hand with his, squeezes. And then lets go.

"The Commander wants us to make some noise," she says, and pulls her staff from her back. Dorian, Blackwall, and Varric fall close at her heels, similarly drawing their weapons, and she takes comfort in the familiar sounds of it, the mechanical click of Bianca, the hum of Dorian's staff, the scuff of Blackwall's boots against the floor. He's new to the band, but they've fought together enough for her to know the weight of him at her back as surely as any of the others. He's one of her people. They are, all of them, _her people._

And she will not fail them.

"So let's _make some fucking noise._ "


	3. thaumaturgy

_This is your fault,_ Dorian thinks, as he lights the way through the snow.

_This is your fault,_ Dorian thinks, as he pours what little mana he has left into keeping the fires burning in camp.

_This is your fault,_ Dorian thinks, as he sits huddled into his cloak, listening to the cries of the wounded, the sobs of the grieving, and the angry, bitter words spilling out like blood between Cassandra and the Commander. _This is your fault._

Ultimately, _logically,_ he knows this is not the case. He didn’t cause the Elder One, whoever he is, to attack Haven tonight, any more than he is responsible for the hole in the sky. Tarred with the collective brush, on virtue of the country of his birth, perhaps, but even in the depths of his guilt he can recognize that there’s little more than he could possibly have done that he didn’t already do. He came to Ferelden, he warned the nice people, he stopped his former mentor from rewriting history: he’s good. He knows this.

And yet all he can think about is Evelyn, left behind to die in the cold or the dragon’s jaws, he doesn’t know which. They all heard the avalanche, so close on their heels as they fled the town, so he knows that she managed that, at least. And they heard the frustrated scream of the beast as it flew away, only barely ahead of the flood of snow and ice, so it’s unlikely that it had time to eat her before it made its escape. But even considering that, there is still the avalanche itself to consider. The chances that she survived it- They’re just so small-

_Which is what you’ve been telling yourself for the last three hours,_ he snarls to himself. _To justify the fact that you wouldn’t go back for her._

Not only did he not go back for her, but he wouldn’t allow the others to go, either. He practically had to _drag_ Varric away by the collar- no mean feat, considering that dwarves weigh considerably more than they look, considering their stature. Blackwall was in shock, making it easy to herd him with a few sharp words, but Varric fought to go back, even managed to land a solid punch to his ribs that left him gasping before he gave up and went limp in Dorian’s grip. Dorian will have a bruise there for days, but it’s far less than what he deserves for what he did. He wouldn’t go back into a pit of shifting ice and snow on the impossibility that she survived, and he wouldn’t allow the others to die for it, either, and that is something he’ll have to live with for the rest of his life.

He feels the presence behind him before he hears the footstep on the snow, and looks up knowing that it’s Solas, because none of the others can move so quietly. The elf puts a hand to his shoulder and leans in. “Something just tripped the outer wards,” he says quietly, low enough that even the others can’t hear. “It might just be an animal-”

“I’ll get the Commander,” Dorian says, before he can finish. His throat is tight with simultaneous hope and despair, as he rises and heads for the outer edge of the camp, collecting Cullen as he goes with a soft touch to his shoulder and a quick word in his ear. If it’s not an animal, it’s almost certainly an enemy, some surviving portion of the army at Haven that managed to find their trail and follow them. There’s absolutely no way it could be-

“Evelyn,” Cullen breathes, his Southern eyes deciphering the huddled figure in the snow before Dorian can do more than spot the outline, and then the Commander starts to run. Dorian swallows hard and flounders after as best he can in the snowdrifts, sliding to his knees beside a kneeling Cullen, who has already picked up their Herald and cradled her close to his chest. “Evelyn, can you hear me?”

One gloved hand comes up and catches on to that absurd fur mantle. It wavers for a moment, and then she fists her hand so tight that the fabric pulls halfway across Cullen’s shoulders. Dorian can’t hear her response, weak as it is, but Cullen closes his eyes and crushes her against his chest. Alive, then. Somehow, alive- but not for long.

_This is your fault,_ Dorian thinks, and then, _Time for recriminations later._

“Commander,” Dorian says, and when that gets no response, “Cullen!”

Cullen snaps his gaze up, his eyes a dark blaze of emotion. “What?”

“We need to get her warm,” Dorian says, speaking slowly because he knows that Cullen is almost as badly in shock as Evelyn, just now. “She doesn’t seem too badly hurt, so it’s likely just the cold.” _Just the cold,_ he says, as if it’s nothing. “We need to warm her up.”

Cullen’s hand wavers as it strokes her hair off her face. “She never gets cold.”

_Why am I not surprised that you know that._ “She usually has enough magic to keep herself warm,” he says gently. “If we can get her to the fire, I can give her some of mine to tide her over until she starts to regenerate mana on her own.” Not that he has much left, either, but he’s not the only mage in the camp, and others can be responsible for keeping the fires going and the wards fresh. He’ll gladly drain himself dry if it means she stops lying so still, half-insensate with cold and shock. “The sooner we get started, the better.”

Cullen gives a short, jerky nod, then gathers her up and stands with a tremendous heave. Dorian is, in spite of the circumstances, distantly impressed as the Commander stumps back into camp with Evelyn’s limp weight in his arms, apparently heedless of the snowdrifts that threaten to topple Dorian at every step. _Southerners,_ he thinks, and scrambles after him.

Solas, apparently hearing the commotion, clearly alerted the other members of the council and Cassandra and Leliana are waiting at one of the outer fires, a thick woolen cloak at the ready to receive their half-frozen Herald. The rest of the camp doesn’t seem to have noticed what was going on, and the lady Nightingale, always playing the angles, has clearly elected not to notify the masses until she has more information. Her hands are deft as she wraps the barely-conscious Evelyn in a blanket and helps Cullen settle her near the fire, where Dorian is waiting.

“Give me her hands,” Dorian says, and Cullen rearranges her so that her hands are free from the blanket but the rest of her remains tightly wrapped. He tenderly pulls off her gloves and turns her towards Dorian, who smiles tightly, thinking of that afternoon in the hayloft, only two days back. It seems like longer. “You remembered.”

This spell is so much simpler when both parties are awake and able to participate, but for a one-directional transfer Dorian doesn’t need her consent. He grasps her hands in his, refusing to allow himself to dwell on how utterly chilled and bloodless her fingers are, and starts to feed her mana. Slow, at first, so as not to overwhelm her already battered body, and then faster as he starts to feel the edges of her magic open up to him. She is still cold and still, only the faint fog of her breath to prove she still lives, but the faintest flush of color is starting to come back to her cheeks. If he can just get enough mana into her, then her natural instincts towards spellcraft will kick in and she’ll start to warm herself.

Too soon, however, his own limited reserves run dry, and he lets her hand drop with an oath. It’s not enough, he knows that already. She needs more.

“Damnation,” he says, low and savage. “If only we had some lyrium-”

“None survived the flight from Haven,” says Leliana, unexpectedly close. He doesn’t allow himself to jump, but it’s a near thing. “In a week, perhaps, we will be able to replenish our supply-”

“I’m not even certain we have the rest of the night,” Dorian confesses, and squeezes his eyes shut. “After a certain point, the body shuts down to conserve energy, and it needs a great deal more to make it come back up again. It’s going to be a long, cold night- if we can’t get something into her to get her back up over that threshold-”

“The other mages-” Cassandra says, but Dorian only shakes his head.

“As drained as I, if not worse, in some cases. Solas is the only one left with any reserve, and he can’t do it. He could heal her after but- We tried on the road, before. It takes a fair bit of training in thaumaturgy just to attempt it, and he’s studied other arts. Were I trained in elementalism, like-” He stutters out, takes a breath, and starts again. “-like Evelyn, I could pull the heat from the fire next to us and give it to her, but I can’t. I don’t know how. I can only take energy from a living person, and _don’t_ tell me how that smacks of blood magic-”

“Take mine,” Cullen interrupts. Dorian blinks up at him. “You said you could take energy from a mundane, if we consent. Is that true?”

_Evelyn doesn’t like that word,_ he thinks nonsensically. “It is, but-”

“Then take mine. There’s still traces of lyrium in my system, that will help, right?”

Dorian is just cognizant enough to distantly recognize the confession inherent in those words, something he’s almost certain Evelyn hasn’t yet been told, but he sets it aside in favor of more immediate concerns. “It will make it easier. But it still won’t be comfortable for you. Commander-”

“Do it,” Cullen says, his jaw set. His usually mobile face is still as stone, and even Dorian can’t miss the determination in his eyes. “Take as much as you need.”

Dorian has no claim of friendship on this man, no intimate words and secrets exchanged as he knows Cullen has done with Evelyn. But he was in the room for their argument about the mage alliance, and he has heard enough rumors of the man’s service in Kirkwall to understand what it means for him to be able to offer this. This is no small thing that Cullen is offering, and to a man who Dorian knows full well Cullen doesn’t trust.

_You must love her very much, you poor bastard,_ Dorian thinks, and then holds out his right hand. His left he keeps wrapped around Evelyn’s wrist, his fingers pressed lightly against her pulse.

“Give me your hand,” he says, and when Cullen complies, he warns him, one last time, “This won’t be comfortable on your end. You need to stay still for me to maintain the link. Do you understand?”

“Do it,” Cullen says, and grips his hand tight. “I can endure.”

_I’ve no doubt of that,_ Dorian thinks sadly. “All right. We begin.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry this took so long, I actually had it written and life just kept interfering with me posting it. I have had a truly impressive string of inconveniences and bad luck for the last several weeks, I'd give the universe a round of applause if it wasn't happening to me.


	4. in the dark

It was very late into the night when Cullen finally managed to force himself to go to sleep, but he’s still not surprised when he wakes to find it still pitch-black inside his tent. He’s more surprised that he managed to drop off at all, considering. His every bone and muscle still aches, hard-used by their flight from Haven and worsened by sorrow and stress and anger, and he can’t stop replaying that moment in the Chantry, when Evelyn looked away from him and he knew that she intended to go to her death. She came back, but the grief will not go away. That the Maker brought her back to them is a miracle he will kneel in thanks for the rest of his days, but it doesn’t take away from her sacrifice. Just the consequences.

He lies awake for a few moments before something- some noise, perhaps, or shift in the air- alerts him to the fact that he is not alone in his tent. He keeps his breathing steady and stealthily moves his hand to the hilt of his sword next to his bedroll, moving as slowly as possible so as not to give himself away. Any of his men would have announced themselves, and Leliana’s scouts know better than to surprise him, so it must be-

“It’s me,” a hoarse female voice comes from his right. “Please don’t stab me.” Evelyn, sounding absolutely exhausted. “I’m too tired to get stabbed.”

He lets his hand fall away from his sword and shifts up onto his elbow, peering at the corner where her voice originated as if it will help him see better in the absolute dark. “Maker’s breath. You scared the life out of me.”

“Sorry,” she says, and he hears her shift- in awkwardness, in contrition, he knows not. “I just needed a place to get away from everyone staring at me. I was conferring with the others for a while, but it got- too much. And Cassandra said you’d gone to sleep here, so…”

“Was sent to sleep here like a child overdue for a nap, is more accurate,” Cullen says, with a humor he doesn’t entirely feel. Cassandra was right to send him away- the fact that he slept at all is proof of that- but he should have been out there, with his men. No one can afford the luxury of sleep just now, but his weakness, as always, forces him to things he would not have otherwise done. “But you’re more than welcome to join me.”

There’s a beat of silence after his words, and he feels his face flush with blood as he realizes how that sounded. “In my tent!” he blurts, then winces as he realizes that it doesn’t sound much better. “To rest. My tent is your tent.” He sighs. “Maker.”

“The offer is greatly appreciated,” she says, and there’s a rough kind of humor in her voice now, underneath the exhaustion. “I’m taking full advantage of it.”

He suspects that she was sitting awake in the corner rather than asleep in a bedroll of her own, which doesn’t quite qualify as “taking full advantage,” but he doesn’t call her on it. He knows what she’d say, anyway- “Didn’t I sleep enough already?” As if drifting in and out of consciousness for a few hours is at all the same thing. Stubborn woman.

“How goes the planning?”

“Eh.” He can sense movement, and guesses that she’s giving her usual broad, exasperated shrug with her hands. “It goes. Solas doesn’t know _exactly_ where this fortress is, just that it’s somewhere to the north of here, further into the mountains. And so it begins: Leliana wants us to head west down to the plains, as there is a friendly comte a week’s ride away. Cassandra wants to put stone at our backs, so we can’t be attacked from behind. Josephine just wants to go _somewhere_.”

“So the same, then,” Cullen says wryly. “And what of you?”

“If others wish to go west to Orlais I will not stop them. I will go to Skyhold.”

Something about the heavy determination in her voice makes his throat go tight. “I doubt the others will disagree, by the light of day.” Evelyn’s will is a fearsome thing even in ordinary times, and times are so very far from ordinary. Even if they were to disagree, who would follow anyone but the Herald after this night?

“Perhaps,” she says. And even in the darkness, he can feel her unwavering gaze on him. “What about you? Do you disagree?”

He considers and discards a handful of responses, but what finally comes out of his mouth is nothing but the unvarnished truth. “If Skyhold is where you will take us, then Skyhold is where I will go.”

There’s a long beat of silence, and then- “You give me more faith than I deserve.”

Despite himself he smiles, recognizing something familiar in that. Didn’t he once say something like that to her? And so, not failing to appreciate the irony, he gently gives her own words back to her. “I think I give you just the right amount. Lady Herald.”

She gives an amused huff through her nose. “If you say so.” Another pause. “Dorian told me what you did.”

There are any number of things to which she could be referring, but he doesn't bother asking for clarification. He knows what she means. "It was nothing."

"Well you'll forgive me if I think it meant quite a lot to me," she comes back. He can hear the smile in her voice. “I hope the experience wasn’t too traumatic.”

He wants to scoff at that- wants to be _able_ to scoff at that- but it hits too close to home. He knows it’s entirely too obvious that he’s uncomfortable with magic, though he hopes he’s never given her cause to feel uncomfortable with the use of her own around him. “It was… tolerable,” he says, which is about as polite a word as he can use to describe the sensation of his own life force draining slowly away from him, like ropes of cold steel being dragged out from the inside of his skin. “No worse than I expected. Pavus warned me it would be be uncomfortable.”

“Yes, he said. Still. I’m sorry you had to go through that.”

“It was well worth the cost.”

She says nothing in return, and for a moment he feels he’s been too- something, too open or too raw. But then there comes the rustling sound of movement, and a moment later he feels a hand on his, warm in spite of the frigid midnight chill and shockingly bare. He’s almost never _seen_ her without gloves, much less had her touch him, and he grips back hard, just for a moment unable to think of how desperate it must seem.

Then she makes a small, shocked noise, and the awareness comes flooding back. The back of his neck goes hot and he starts to draw back, but she only grips his hand harder, stalling his retreat before it can properly get started, and clicks her tongue. “Maker, Cullen, your hands are like ice. Give me your other one.”

“It is rather cold outside,” he says, his voice wry despite the way pinwheels seem to be turning in his ribcage. “You might have noticed, considering the state you were in when we found you.”

“Shut your face,” she says absently, and tugs on the hand she already has captive until he reaches out blindly with his other and she grabs that one, too. He feels as much as hears her moving closer, until she’s on her knees next to his bedroll, and then she lifts both his hands towards her mouth and exhales, slow and steady.

Her breath is hot against his knuckles, and sweet Andraste, but the flush up the back of his neck must be an inferno, now. Cullen blesses the Maker for the impenetrable darkness between them that keeps her from seeing how discomfited he is by such a simple intimacy, and blesses Him even further that even with the light she couldn’t tell the way that desire suddenly squirms through his belly like hot snakes. She’s barely even touching him, for Andraste’s sake, and he’s reduced to this- like a lad who first encounters a lady in her underthings. It’s mortifying. Knowing that it’s likely to be just as much a reaction to the events of the day before doesn’t really help, in the moment.

“There,” she says, her lips still a scant inch away from his hands. “Better?”

He pulls his head out of… wherever it’s gone… and refocuses on his hands, which are, to his surprise, actually warm. Actually, now that he's thinking about it, he can feel the slow crawl of heat proceeding up his arms. As he blinks at the place where he knows she kneels in stunned wonderment, the march of warmth hits his chest and detonates like an Antivan firepot, leaving him flushed from head to toe.

“Sweet Maker,” he breathes. “Evelyn, what did you do?”

"Oh. Um." She tugs slightly on their joined hands, like she's going to pull away, but he tightens his fingers on her and holds her fast. "Just a warming charm. I… should probably have asked first. That's incredibly rude of me, I'm sorry."

He didn't realize how _cold_ he truly was until just now. For the first time he can understand how Pavus manages to wander around in robes that leave one entire arm and shoulder bare. Tremendous waste of magic, but still. "Don't be sorry," he says, still a little stunned. "You can do that whenever you like."

"Oh!" she says, and he can't see it but he knows she's grinning. Her fingers tighten around his in return. "Well. Can't have the commander of the Inquisition shivering on my watch, can I?"

"The commander of the Inquisition is better-equipped than most of you northerners," Cullen replies, amused. "At least I know how to dress for it. Speaking of which, you wouldn't happen to still have your cloak, would you?"

A pause, and then she says, ruefully, "I just shook my head. Alas, it was in my quarters, with the rest of my things. Suppose I'll have to throw myself on the Inquisition's charity once more."

"Such as it is," Cullen says with a sigh. He knows both of them are trying very hard not to think of the events of the last day, and he doesn't want to be the one who brings the conversation back to more serious matters. "Well, if you've no cloak, I don't think you can afford to be wasting magic on the likes of me."

"I can't think of a better reason," she says, but she does, at last, draw her hands back. The warmth of her spell still lingers, bubbling through his veins like fine whiskey, but his skin feels the loss of her nonetheless. "We… It's still a few hours till dawn. We should get some sleep, while we can."

She's not wrong, however much he wants to cling to the false intimacy that the concealing dark brings to them, to use her words and her wit and her laughter to chase away the thoughts of today. Still, there's something yet he can do for her.

He rolls back a bit onto his hip in order to free the corner of the blanket that's caught under his thigh, and bundles it together and thrusts it in her general direction. "Here. You need it more than I."

She makes no move to take it. "Fire mage, remember?"

He makes a frustrated noise in the back of his throat. "Not four hours ago you were so drained you were nearly unconscious." He makes a conscious decision not to think about the sight of her, so pale and still he'd have thought her dead already if he hadn't been able to feel her sluggish pulse. The image will haunt his dreams often enough for the weeks and months to come: it has no place here. "I know you recover quickly, Evelyn, but truly. Take the damn blanket."

"Well." She chuckles, low and throaty, and a minute later he feels her take the blanket from him. "When you put it that way."

He settles back down onto his bedroll, pulls his coat a little tighter over his shoulders. He's sure that by dawn the chill will have well and truly settled into his bones once more- but that would have been true regardless, and right now the warmth she gave him is still more than sufficient. "Thank you."

"I think those thanks should go the other way 'round," she says, still sounding amused. There's a bit of rustling, and he can picture her settling back into her corner of the tent. "Considering."

"Yes. Well." He clears his throat. "You're welcome."

There's a long pause, so long he starts to think she's truly fallen asleep. And then, finally, so quietly he can barely hear it-

"I'm glad you made it out."

_You too,_ he thinks, but does not say. She wouldn't welcome it, not now. Perhaps later. Instead, he fakes a snore- and then falls asleep in true a few minutes later, the sound of her laughter still echoing softly in his ears.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the end of everything I have written currently. I'm going to try to keep working on this, but I do have a couple other projects that have taken up my authorial attention recently, so we'll see how it goes. If I don't make it back to this anytime soon, I at least feel like I left it in a good place heading towards their relationship.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm [sorrelchestnut](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/sorrelchestnut) on tumblr. Come say hi!


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